erasty was an old, very old practice, being
mentioned before circumcision; it prevailed among many of the Orientals,
and among the many peoples by whom the early Jews were surrounded, who
were, according to the Old Testament, about as an immoral, dissolute,
and bestial a set as one could well imagine. Their religions were
nothing but a gross mixture of stupid superstition and blind idolatry,
pederasty, fornication, and general cussedness. In the then state of the
Jewish nation, to have allowed them to mingle freely with these people
would have ended in having the Jews adopt all their customs and habits.
The aim of the Jewish leaders was to prevent any too free intercourse of
their people with these nations, that they might remain uncontaminated
even while dwelling near them. To accomplish this it was necessary to
raise a barrier that would be the distinguishing mark of the Jewish
nation. Jahns, in his learned work on the "History of the Hebrew
Commonwealths,"[41] lays down the idea that circumcision, as well as
many articles in their laws,--which to us appear trivial,--were in
reality intended to separate the Jews farther and farther from their
idolatrous, bestial, and heathenish neighbors, while at the same time
these same ordinances were intended to preserve a constant knowledge of
the true and only God, and maintain their moral and physical health.

Although hermaphrodism on a large scale, as an existing condition, was a
matter of serious belief at the end of the eighteenth century, it has
occupied no little attention in this. Courts have been called to decide
on cases to invalidate marriages, or to decide the sex, more than once;
and physicians are often asked the question, Do hermaphrodites really
exist? Dr. Debierre, of Lyons, published in 1886 a valuable paper,
entitled "Hermaphrodism Before the Civil Code: its Nature, Origin, and
Social Consequences," which was published in the _Archives of Criminal
Anthropology_ of Lyons, France. In this short but very concise treatise,
Debierre gives us a complete review of the subject from mythological
times to 1886. It must be quite evident to all that there exists no
logical reasons why the sexual or generative organs should be exempt
from, at times, being subject to variations from the normal, either
through the commingling of two conceptions or of faulty development
affecting other parts of the body,--conditions that go to form
monstrosities. Debierre gives one peculiar ca